1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the composition of non-explosive, non-hazardous explosive simulants that can be used to test equipment designed to remotely detect explosives.
2. Description of Related Art
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has used explosive simulants for many years to field test various automated explosive detection systems embedded within baggage inspection systems at airports, and to train the operators of this equipment. The FAA develops and validates training aids for baggage inspectors and hand-searchers to help them distinguish threats from false alarms. The best explosive simuiant is a physical model that imitates selected attributes of the more complex, real-world system. Simulators are particularly useful to hone, test, and evaluate the abilities of personnel and equipment when a real-world environment is too costly or not available.
The FAA and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have previously collaborated on a type of explosive simulant for canine-trace detection and training, referred to as Non-Energetic Simulants for Training and Testing (NESTT). NESTT materials use a trace quantity of explosive material diluted in various inert substances. Although explosive material is present, the NESTT materials are not detonable or explosive. See U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,359,936, 5,413,812, and 5,648,636 to Simpson et al.
The need for better explosive simulants becomes more critical as the threat to airport security increases and the ability of equipment to discern secondary bulk explosives improves. Existing simulants have significant limitations that prevent their valid use in field testing many of the recently developed explosive detection systems. For example, the NESTT materials, although non-detonable, still require handling of actual explosive material. Also, many of the conventional simulants simply do not fool the automated explosive detection systems; if they do, the simulants frequently cause the systems to report misleading information that can either confuse an operator or compromise a detection performance test, or both. The conventional use of rigid plastics has limited the physical form and concealment types in improvised explosive device design, and represents a fairly narrow coverage of explosive types. This limitation in particular has made the development of simulants of more pliable explosive materials, as well as explosive emulsions and gels, quite desirable.
Because the conventional simulants have limited usefulness in training operators, testing automated x-ray detection systems, and accurately simulating improvised explosive devices, there is a need for explosive simulants that contain no trace explosive materials, yet exhibit accurately controlled physical properties that specifically and reliably duplicate selected characteristics of real explosives which are recognized by specific explosive detection systems. The present invention addresses these challenges.